Radeon HD 7970 GHz Edition vs. R9 280X - Should I upgrade?
Category : Should I Upgrade?
Published by Marc Büchel on 20.01.14
A gamer simply can't get enough graphics power in their rig, which makes the upgrade question omnipresent. To show you whether it makes sense to upgrade from one generation to another we created this series of articles, where we will compare graphics cards from different generations. Today we're having a close look at the differences between the Radeon HD 7970 GHz Edition and the R9 280X.
Comparing the Radeon R9 280X with the
Radeon HD 7970 GHz Edition can be quite interesting. Despite the fact, that both
cards are based on the same chip and architecture, the older card is a little
bit quicker than the new one. Looking at the results a bit closer shows, that
the R9 280X is about 2.1 percent slower on average than the Radeon HD 7970 GHz
Edition, when it comes to ingame performance. The biggest performance
differences can be found with Skyrim. In this case, frame rates are about 4
percent higher on a Radeon HD 7970 GHz. On the other side there is the Metro
Last Light, where the R9 280X is 1.1 percent quicker.
At this point we also want to have a closer look at power consumption. If we
equip our test system with a Radeon HD 7970 GHz Edition we see that it pulls 60
Watts from the plub, whereas the same setup with a R9 280X only needs 48 Watt.
Under load conditions there is also a rather big difference between the two
cards. Once we plugged the Radeon HD 7970 GHz Edition card into the test system
power consumption goes up to 360 Watt and with the R9 280X power consumption
doesn't go past 320 Watt. On thing appears to be quite obvious: although both
cards are based on the same chip, the R9 280X is doing the job in a more energy
efficient way. If you ask us why this is so, that is a completely other question
and we have to say we're afraid, but we don't have an answer to it.
Since the Radeon HD 7970 GHz Edition is quicker on average than the R9 280X it
simply doesn't make sense at all if you "upgrade" from the older card to the
newer one. In the end there is a simple reason why the old card is quicker than
the new one. Once we have a closer look at clock speeds we see the reference
7970 GHz Edition clocks with 1100 MHz whereas the R9 280X runs at 1070 MHz.
Basically, when looking at our results, we see that the only good reason to buy
a Radeon R9 280X over a 7970 GHz Edition or to upgrade to a Radeon R9 280X is
power efficiency. In our opinion this is not worth the money, which is why we
would stick with the Radeon HD 7970 GHz Edition.
A gamer simply can't get enough graphics power in their rig, which makes the upgrade question omnipresent. To show you whether it makes sense to upgrade from one generation to another we created this series of articles, where we will compare graphics cards from different generations. Today we're having a close look at the differences between the Radeon HD 7970 GHz Edition and the R9 280X. 
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